BREAKING THROUGH

Recommendations

Info

and allocating capital for women-owned businesses, there are many more women than slots available. We also found that women often have to work harder to be taken seriously and fight perceptions that female founders are less capable and less committed than their male counterparts. At the same time, several of the entrepreneurs and business experts we interviewed said that women sometimes have to overcome internal challenges, including a lack of confidence and a smaller appetite for risk. Whether it has a cultural, educational or personal source, the lack of confidence can show up in different ways. At New York Tech Meetup, for example, Executive Director Jessica Lawrence has at times had to beg and cajole female founders to present their companies at the organization’s demo nights. Women entrepreneurs, she says, claim they’re not ready to go public or their product is not ready or they’re “not tech enough.” Only when she, reluctantly, organized an all-women demo night, did she get significant numbers of women entrepreneurs willing to go on stage. “If I tell a woman I don’t have a demo slot, she’s more likely to disappear and never come back,” says Lawrence. “Men are much more aggressive. One guy sent me a different email every day for 28 days straight with a new reason every day for why he should get to do a demo. I don’t see women doing that.” Finally, too few women entrepreneurs are applying for and winning city government contracts, a problem since doing business with government can catapult small businesses to new heights. Mayor de Blasio has admirably taken new steps to increase the number of women and minority businesses who receive city contracts, but much work remains. In fiscal year 2015, just 1.5 percent of total city spending went to women-owned businesses. And relatively few women are even certified as Women Business Enterprises (WBEs), a designation needed to apply for the city’s Minority and Women Business Enterprise (M/WBE) contracting program. As of January 2016, 1,481 businesses were certified WBEs, including 710 in Manhattan, 309 in Brooklyn, 259 in Queens, 125 in the Bronx and 78 in Staten Island. Harnessing the potential of women entrepreneurs in New York City Despite these and many other challenges, women are contributing enormously to New York City’s economy. At the same time, however, the city has only begun to harness the tremendous potential of women entrepreneurs. Unleashing the full potential of women entrepreneurs in New York would have a far-reaching impact on the city’s economy. For instance, if only one quarter of the existing 376,405 women-owned businesses in the city with no employees added a single employee in the next three years, it would result in more than 94,000 new jobs. In a city where women make up 52 percent of the population, there is undoubtedly an opportunity to increase the number of women entrepreneurs, particularly in low-income communities. But an equally important task will be to help more of the city’s women-owned businesses scale up and grow. This means ensuring that more of the women who operate homebased businesses expand into a storefront or office, that more of the small-scale food manufactures export their products beyond New York and that more startup tech firms gain access to venture capital and realize their potential for growth. The good news is that, especially in today’s entrepreneurial economy, the opportunity to do all this is unlimited. “I think we focus a little too much on the inequity of it all, and not enough on the investment opportunity,” says Susan Lyne, founder and managing partner of BBG (Built by Girls) Ventures, which invests in early stage women-led startups. “Women are the dominant users of the fastest growing social platforms, we spend more time and do more with our mobile phones, and we make or influence 85 percent of consumer purchases. It’s smart business—not to mention common sense—to back entrepreneurs who know that end user best.” 12 Center for an Urban Future
RECOMMENDATIONS Women entrepreneurs have already become a major force in New York City’s economy, with the number of businesses founded by women on the rise in every sector of the city’s economy. Yet, New York—like virtually every other city in America—has only begun to tap the enormous potential of women entrepreneurs across the five boroughs. In the months and years ahead, there is a clear opportunity to expand the overall number of women entrepreneurs and also ensure that more women-owned businesses grow to the next level. Doing so will strengthen the city’s economy, create jobs and bolster neighborhoods across the city. While the de Blasio administration WE NYC initiative is a major step in the right direction, more could be done—by government as well as private industry and nonprofits. To that end, we propose the 22 achievable policy recommendations. These recommendations are fleshed out in more detail beginning on page 42 of this report, but below is a brief summary of our ideas. Develop New Initiatives to Help Existing Women-Owned Businesses Grow • Launch a program focused on supporting—and scaling up—home-based businesses • Expand awareness of existing programs that could help women grow their business • Establish a Female Entrepreneurs Growth Innovation Fund • Expand export opportunities for New York’s women-owned businesses • Expand the number of certified Women Business Enterprises • Double the number of female contractors who get city contracts by 2020 • Help New York City’s certified WBEs access other government contracting and private sector supply chain opportunities • Ease restrictions that prevent successful child care businesses from expanding Create incentives for banks and alternative lenders to make more small loans • Expand the city’s Capital Access Loan Guarantee program • Give banks CRA credit for making very small business loans • Ensure that more women entrepreneurs whose loan applications are rejected by banks get referred to a microlending institution for access to capital, credit building assistance and other business support services Develop programs to support older women entrepreneurs Begin offering child care services at some of the city’s small business centers, accelerators and incubators Recruit experienced women business owners and executives from every industry sector to be mentors Increase the number of women professionals involved in SCORE Create more opportunities for women entrepreneurs to team up and start companies with co-founders Establish an annual showcase event where women entrepreneurs can meet and pitch the city’s top venture capital leaders Set a goal of doubling the number of women partners at New York City-based venture capital funds Increase the number of women investors Build upon efforts already underway to increase the number of women working in the tech sector
Page 1 and 2: nycfuture.org MARCH 2016 BREAKING T
Page 3 and 4: BREAKING THROUGH As technology disr
Page 5 and 6: Entrepreneurs Festival, the event a
Page 7 and 8: tors, women are stepping up, taking
Page 9 and 10: In the third quarter of 2015, 16.9
Page 11: eraged $80,000 in annual sales, jus
Page 15 and 16: diverse, because people from differ
Page 17 and 18: Americans (BCNA) to start Smiles Ar
Page 19 and 20: inging jobs and investment to the c
Page 21 and 22: for example, women-owned businesses
Page 23 and 24: enues, 257.4 percent over the previ
Page 25 and 26: While women still account for fewer
Page 27 and 28: UNDER NEW MANAGEMENT Women-owned bu
Page 29 and 30: or loans to help providers get prog
Page 31 and 32: all small businesses struggle to ac
Page 33 and 34: portant,” says Tiffany Goldberg,
Page 35 and 36: seasoned entrepreneurs. And for man
Page 37 and 38: NOTHING VENTURED, NOTHING GAINED Wo
Page 39 and 40: For black women founders in tech, t
Page 41 and 42: individuals and communities interac
Page 43 and 44: Strategic Steps for Growth as a way
Page 45 and 46: the number of loans made through th
Page 47 and 48: ATLANTA Like the rest of the nation
Page 49 and 50: usiness lifecycle. There’s a popu
Page 51 and 52: pire, and Ebby Halliday, who starte
Page 53 and 54: WASHINGTON, D.C. Though Washington,
Page 55 and 56: “I want these businesses to becom
Page 57 and 58: SAN FRANCISCO San Francisco anchors
Page 59 and 60: employees—illustrates the city’
Page 61 and 62: ADVISORY BOARD We acknowledge the h

BREAKING THROUGH

Create successful ePaper yourself

Delete template?

Save as template?